


Paris, Manchester

by redfiona



Category: World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-10-09
Updated: 2007-10-09
Packaged: 2017-10-07 17:00:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/67183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redfiona/pseuds/redfiona
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Holiday in Paris, or something like it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Paris, Manchester

**Author's Note:**

> Set Autumn 2004

It started with a simple throwaway comment over the phone. They were discussing the all the travelling they would have to do for the European tour and Rene said it was a shame that there wasn't a show in France because he'd never been to Paris.

"You're joking!"

"No. I've never been."

And now you couldn't really have that, could you? A man whose whole gimmick was as a madly patriotic Frenchman and he'd never been to Paris, the most beautiful city in the world!

This would have to be remedied.

So Sylvain planned. He knew when and where he would be needed, and more importantly when he had the time for a short detour to Paris. Then he looked at Rene's itinerary and tried to find some time when he too could be away and see if those dates intersected. Of course life was never that easy, so they didn't. He wasn't really expecting them to, what with them being on two different shows. That was the worst of it, on the days he had off, Rene had to travel and on the days Rene had off, he had to travel.

Sylvain tried to see if there was anywhere where they could have fitted in a trip, and he swore that it would have worked if only Rene didn't have that blasted show up in Helsinki. If you took out the travelling for that and the actual day they would be there then there was plenty of time. The only problem now was to come up with a case that would convince Mr. McMahon that Rene wasn't needed there. Unfortunately that was a big problem, as convincing Mr. McMahon of anything tended to be. The most obvious thing to point out was that there was no historic rivalry between Finland and France so maybe he could just skip the one show.

Of course, that alone wouldn't work, especially since Rene could always find a way to wind crowds up, but it would provide a platform. Sylvain carried on refining his arguments and planning what to do with Rene in Paris when they only had one day. It would be a really touristy day, non-stop museums and art galleries, Montmartre and Notre Dame, it had to be for a first visit, and then maybe a candle-lit supper at one of the superb restaurants along the banks of the Seine.

Then the call came. Rene was tag team champion. Which meant that he would be needed on all the shows of this tour. Which meant he couldn't skip Finland. Which meant the end of this grand adventure that Sylvain had been planning for months. Thankfully he hadn't bought tickets yet, that was some money saved at least.

To say that he was disappointed would be putting it mildly. All that planning for nothing. And then, the day before the show he'd arrived at the train station under the arena they were going to be wrestling in and he had a brainwave. It would be so cool, it wouldn't be Paris but it may well have been the only chance he was going to get to ever do something like that.

~~~~

Rene was confused, but had to believe that it couldn't be anything too bad because Hiroko had only smiled sweetly and laughed when it was mentioned, since she was in on it too, and she wouldn't let anything bad happen to him, as she'd decided to mother Rene. Everyone except him seemed to be in on it, because whenever he'd asked anyone what Sylvain was planning they just smiled and said that it was something fun. He'd also seen several people race up to Sylvain and hand him plastic bags that appeared to have things in them.

It was now a good hour after the show had ended and all the fans had gone home, even most of the technical crew had been and gone, but he was waiting here like he'd been told to. He could hear rather than see Sylvain coming down to where he was standing, his incredibly out of tune voice singing the kind of thing that had made Johnny Halliday a star back when his mother was young.

The tannoy announcer's voice suddenly started, scratchy and mostly unintelligible, even in those few parts where it wasn't inaudible.

"What did she say?"

"Mostly she was saying welcome to the little known city of Manchester Sur Seine." Sylvan was carrying a wicker picnic basket and a rug. He walked over to where Rene was standing and unfolded the rug to put it on the ground. He sat down, opened the wicker basket and indicated that Rene should sit down.

"What are you up to?"

"I couldn't give you Paris, but I can give you this." Sylvain was spreading what smelled like it would be the best cheese Rene had had since the last time he was home. When he started to talk, he pointed with the knife and bread to indicate what he was speaking about.

"Paris is a beautiful city. You've got the trains that take people into the city and back out again, feeling better just for having been there." The train tracks under the steps that lead into the arena were silent; the last train had left half an hour before. "Over there," Sylvain pointed at the girders in the roof, "you have the Eiffel tower. There's something amusing about someone's love nest becoming the internationally recognised symbol of France. We've arrived by train, and gone up the tower, you dragged me out onto the observation platform, because I like you more than I'm afraid of heights. We come down, and head to the Left Bank," the knife swept to the station cafe, closed and dark, "have a quick coffee at the kind of cafe where Sartre and de Beauvoir used to sit. I think we try and think intelligent, existentialist thoughts, I fail miserably because I'm wondering whether I locked the hotel door or not. We walk back, towards Sacre Coeur," there could have been the faint outline of a church through the grimy window that Sylvain was pointing at, "and have a picnic on Montmartre. And that's where we are, Paris laid out in front of us, on a beautiful summer's day."

"You're mad." Rene said it the same way he said I love you, and Sylvain knew.

"I know, isn't it fun." And so they kissed, because what else can you do while picnicking in Paris.

~~~~

The End


End file.
